Monday, October 18, 2010

Interesting story on the Panthers posted today in "Pro Football Weekly,"which is not nearly as high-profile a publication as Sports Illustrated or ESPN but has some good journalists who work hard at their craft.

I know, as I used to be a freelance team correspondent for PFW a number of years ago (they employ one in each NFL city, usually from the hometown newspaper of that team). I haven't done that for a number of years now, but I know several of the folks at PFW, and I can assure you they don't just make things up.

In any event, today's story in PFW absolutely rips the Panthers with such quotes as an unnamed NFL general manager saying: "They are turning the football over way too much. They are getting outcoached. They are getting outplayed. The issue right now is that the little things are not getting done."

And from an unnamed league exec:

"The Panthers have enough talent to be competitive. They have a bad coaching staff. I don't know how good Fox is at evaluating. I think he is a good head coach — he knows how to coach and motivate a team, but there's a lot more to the job than that nowadays."If you look at their roster, probably 75 percent of it is (comprised of) draft picks. They have a young roster, and if you are going to play young, you better have a strong coaching staff that is invested. Their coaching staff is working on the last year of their deals. They don't know where they will be after this year. They are more worried about their next jobs than they are about coaching this football team."

There's more negative stuff besides that, but you get the idea.

Now it's easy to rip a winless team, and even more so anonymously. Take all of this with a grain of salt, as if the Panthers were winning, you'd find plenty of "league execs" and "unnamed GMs" praising the team to the high heavens.

48 comments:

Of course they would praise them if they were winning because that would mean they were doing something right. That is the reason people love sports, it is the beauty of sports, in most cases you are reward according to your performance. If you perform well you win. If you don't perform well you lose. I have thought all along that the coaching has been subpar. I am glad to hear someone who is in the business agrees.

I agree, the team's primary problem is the coaching. They are ruining the confidence of some fine young quarterbacks with a lot of potential...not just Clausen but Matt Moore as well. The play calling is just not working this year and didn't work well last year. It is a good thing that most of them coaching staff will be gone after this year if all goes as expected.

The Panthers have one of the Worst Management teams in the NFL. Its like they have no intentions of winning. They could have gotten T.O, and Michael Vick for pennies. They picked a QB who can't throw a effective pass,over 25 yds...The owner should just sale team, and retire.

I think those are accurate assessments. The team isn't stocked with UFL rejects. There is talent on the squad. The major problem has been the coach. He stubbornly clings to the 1965 philosophy of running between the tackles 80% of the time and throwing deep sideline balls the other 20% and actually liking it when we have to punt. If I ever meet a mule, I'm sending it to John Fox for stubborn practice.

We have a fleet of extremely raw but fast receivers. Run a couple of end-arounds, throw some screens, roll the QB out (to the wide side, when the ball is on the hash). Get them in space. Get Goodson 10-12 touches a game in space. Let Double Trouble run outside every now and then (the only time they break big runs is when they run up the middle, AGAIN, nearly get tackled and bounce outside where no one is).

Everyone used to scream that Dan Henning was the problem. Now they're all screaming to fire Davidson. What's the common denominator? The head coach and his 1965 coaching philosophy. Davidson will get fired if he doesn't toe the company line and call only sideline deep routes and runs between the tackles.

Everyone thinks Fox will have a job in 5 minutes if we let him go. Based on what? He took one team of mid-level talent to a Super Bowl ('03), and coached 7-9 records out of one 1-15 team ('02) and one team that had 14 key players on IR ('04). He has also coached a Super Bowl contender to an 8-8 record ('06) another playoff contender to an 8-8 record ('09) and has coached a team for 8 previous years without developing a single NFL-caliber wide receiver.

Yes, it is easy to rip a winless team and the local media should be doing it more. Yes, if they were winning they would praise them. Is that really news? I have always thought that was the way things were.

I am so tired of hearing people say that Fox is a great head coach and that he will have a head coaching job somewhere else as soon as he loses his job here. He has won only a few more games than he has lost in his career. He is barely above 500, who considers this to be great? I am glad to know that someone is calling it like it is, this team is under-performing and the coaching staff (Other than Meeks) should be fired ASAP. If you are going to start from scratch with the team you need to get rid of the damn lame duck coach.

Jerry chewed off the top 45% of his payroll to put in second and third teamers. He is selling "young" and "opportunities to prove themselves" while saving a ton of money, jacking up ticket prices, and making the fans pay for it all. The guy is the "leader" of the Owners vs. Players Union, so we all should have known better. Too bad he has left us and the few good players - Smity, Beason, Gross, Davis - to just waste another year of their career.

Does anyone remember when that moron Darin Gannt swore up and down that Jeff Davidson was thought so highly of around the league as a possible HC? LMAO!!!!!!!!!!! And you wonder why I call him an idiot all the time.

Just a curious pondering...If JR knows that there will be no football next year, will he actually be a genious for having plenty of money to build his team over the next year with good picks and plenty of cash to sign current and future players??? Of course, I would still be upset with the tix increase if I was a PSL owner. I just have to believe he has been doing this long enough to know what works and is one of the smarter owners (ask reporters, beat writers and players). I am just pondering....

"Take all of this with a grain of salt, as if the Panthers were winning, you'd find plenty of "league execs" and "unnamed GMs" praising the team to the high heavens."

Of course they would give them praise. Why would they praise the Panthers now? You don't give praise to a team if they are losing. Kind of like your job, Scott. If you don't do a good job you don't get any praise. If you do a good job you get some praise. Had any praise lately?

It sucks to lose, but so few people are thinking long term. If we couldn't hang with the Falcons and Saints this year, why not reload and be ready to compete in two years and with lots of cash to spend?

My only beef with Richardson is the ticket hike this year. That is unexplainable.

The Panthers left a good bit of the offense in tact from last year. They were on a tear and I find it hard to understand why they are so terrible. You'd think the defense would stinks because of the player turnover, but they actually keep the team most games. As much as I like and respect Fox, this team has had some really good players over his tenure, yet they never made the playoffs two years in a row. I'm thinking that is why Fox was never offered an extention.

The Panthers left a good bit of the offense in tact from last year. They were on a tear and I find it hard to understand why they are so terrible. You'd think the defense would stinks because of the player turnover, but they actually keep the team most games. As much as I like and respect Fox, this team has had some really good players over his tenure, yet they never made the playoffs two years in a row. I'm thinking that is why Fox was never offered an extention.

So glad they got such insightful comments from NFL people. There wasn't anything in that article that I could not tell you about thePanthers. Maybe I'm a little upset due to the way the panthers have played, but its lame to quote people saying : "yeah the panthers suck." "They're getting out coached" these quotes could have easily come from anyone who watches the panthers. Plus it doesn't mean a whole lot because these comment could have come from someone in the Raiders, Bills, or Browns front office and that means about as much to me as spit in the wind.

Although I believe it, it could also be another team that hopes Fox and company are available next year and wants them for their team.

Either way, it's a win for the Panthers. Fox has ran his course here and it's time to go; he's had talent in the past and it has underachieved.Regardless of how the team was taken apart by current ownership, Fox's tenure here is done. time to move on...

The decision for no extension to Fox was mutual. Everyone keeps blaming Fox/Hurney for the lack of big free agent signings since they have been running things. The Big Cat is the one signing the checks. The Panthers early on went big into a number of expensive over-the-hill free agents and got nothing from it. Since Fox/Hurney have been here they have gone in the other direction with little or no activity in free agency.

I too have felt for some time the main problem has been the coaches and the play calling. I also have some problems with the lack of real information from the media. I know the Panthers are very closed mouth but sometimes I really would like some in-depth analyzation. Take this article by Manish Mehta of the NY Daily News http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/jets/2010/10/swerve-your-enthusiasm-inside.html who writes about how the Jet's defensive coordinator was concerned about how the NFC South Division had carved up the Jets with the misdirection play which the Saints', Falcons', and Panthers' had used against them last year. He told the offensive coordinator they might want to study it. The article goes on to dissect the play and include quotes by some players. Maybe I missed the article but I don't recall anything like this coming out to Panther fans about a play that is so often used. Just a thought. As someone else said, no holding the feet to the fire.

I hate it when some old worn out, has-been, ex-football player from 50 kajillion years ago, becomes a Pro Football owner and decides to piss off all his ticket holders just because he still needs to prove something about being picked up by Johnny Unitas and thinks everyone should have to suffer because he did. That just sucks. For me, the Panthers are a take em' or leave em' team. And I certainly don't lose sleep over them.

Jerrykids said... Don't blame the players, don't blame the coaching. From what I understand Jerry Richardson is leading the lock out cause for the owners.Thus not picking up any marque players this off season (free agency). So now all the PSL owners and Panther fans will suffer thru one of the worst season's the Panthes will have. So Jerry when you send me my bill for PSL's tickets this off seaon maybe I or 69,000 other Panther fans want send in any money.It want just be bad this season, but probably for 3 more years to come.Why don't you sell the team. Your pockets are not deep enough for me.Where is the emphasis on winning the superbowl Jerry?

Marty Hurney and Don Gregory not John Fox are the real ones to blame for this JV team. Dwayne Jarrett should have been cut 3 years ago. That was Marty Hurney and his boy, Don Gregory's pick all the way. Just ask former receiver Coach Richard Williamson. He'll tell it like it really is!

The line in the article that sums it all up. No matter who's to blame, Fox, Hurney, JR, Davidson, all of em; this is the summary of the 0-5 start, and the reason it's not gonna get any better. Bigger issue is the question of ignorance or apathy in the organization being what leads NFL exec to make a statement like this.

We have been getting outcoached for years - Teflon John has just been able to blame enough other asst coaches and players to get away with it.

We are where we are right now because he and Hurney cannot evaluate talent in the WR category or the QB category. The only slack I would cut them for this season is JR's selfishness over the $ - if there is no lockout next season anyone who has bought a ticket for a game this year ought to burn the stadium down.

It is easy to criticize but let's remember back in 1995 when the Panther's decided to go with veterans and Jacksonville with Jack Del Rio as their coach, decided to go with the young team. It took them 2 to 3 years before they were any good at all but when they peaked they were good for a while.Whether that is what the Panthers will be like in 3 years who knows? We need a Bill Parcell TYPE coach, one with experience in rebuilding a team. Cowher and Parcell, both possess the knowledge, insight and experience to put together a winning team. WE NEED A GOOD COACHING TEAM. Cowher could provide all of these characteristics as VP of Football operations.

JR isn't going to paid big bucks for a coach in Bill C, who hasn't coached since 2006.

Once Bill C makes a boneheaded move, this fair wheather fanbase will throw him under the bus.

It wouldn't matter who is running the team, the whiny fans will always bitch about something.

Hurney only sucks at QB and WR, not only but also trade 1st and 2nd round picks. Along not going after FA( in which they overpaid Lucas, Johnson, DJ Hackett, Mike Whale) just to see them not performed to the contract they have gotten.

But besides those things, he has been a good GM.

Every GM drafts a bust every now and then, how the hell could they cut Jarrett when he was rookie in 2007? Thats fucking dumb, considering he hasn't played a game before factoring he was a bust from draft day.